Reader [a frighteningly accurate opening – hi mum!], I have done you a disservice. For I failed to bring you the latest example of the non-top down, top down approach that the coalition government is quickly turning into an art form.
That great comedian and part-time politician / policy maker Eric Pickles is kindly contributing another entry to the case study library (see his first entry here), this time through proposals to regulate the content of local government municipal newspapers.
This, of course, is from the man who said directly to local authorities:
You’ve been a prisoner of regulation, chained to the radiator with red tape, for too long. I want to liberate you. Focus on what really matters.
I can only presume he thinks these municipal publications, erm, really matter.
arbitrary constant 